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Saturday (Paperback)

Description

In his triumphant new novel, Ian McEwan, the bestselling author of Atonement, follows an ordinary man through a Saturday whose high promise gradually turns nightmarish. Henry Perowne-a neurosurgeon, urbane, privileged, deeply in love with his wife and grown-up children-plans to play a game of squash, visit his elderly mother, and cook dinner for his family. But after a minor traffic accident leads to an unsettling confrontation, Perowne must set aside his plans and summon a strength greater than he knew he had in order to preserve the life that is dear to him.

About the Author

Ian McEwan is the bestselling author of more than ten books, including the novels Atonement, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award and the W. H. Smith Literary Award, The Comfort of Strangers and Black Dogs, both shortlisted for the Booker Prize, Amsterdam, winner of the Booker Prize, and The Child in Time, winner of the Whitbread Award, as well as the story collections First Love, Last Rites, winner of the Somerset Maugham Award, and In Between the Sheets. He has also written screenplays, plays, television scripts, a children's book, and the libretto for an oratorio. He lives in London.

Praise For…

“Dazzling. . . . Powerful. . . . McEwan has shown how we . . . live today.” –The New York Times“Finely wrought and shimmering with intelligence.” –The New York Times Book Review“McEwan is supremely gifted. . . . Saturday is a tightly wound tour de force.” –The Washington Post Book World“This extraordinary book is not a political novel. It is a novel about consciousness that illuminates the sources of politics.” –The Nation“Saturday is an exemplary novel, engrossing and sustained. It is undoubtedly McEwan’s best.” –The Spectator“Read the last 100 pages at one sitting–the pace and the thrill allow it. . . . Exhilarating.” –Los Angeles Times Book Review“Virtuosic. . . . Brilliantly macabre and suspenseful. . . . [A] fine novel.” –The Wall Street Journal“McEwan is in the first tier of novelists writing in English today. . . . He has achieved a complete mastery of his craft.” –The New York Observer“This is McEwan at the height of his powers. . . . More audacious than Atonement.” –The Baltimore Sun“In Saturday, the marvelously gifted Ian McEwan turns a single day into nearly twenty-four hours emblematic of an entire era.” –Chicago Tribune“One of the most powerful pieces of post—9/11 fiction yet published.” –The New York Times“Complex, suspenseful. . . . This novel . . . reinforces Ian McEwan’s status as the supreme novelist of his generation.” –The Sunday Times (London)“Engrossing. . . . A thoughtful, measured and mature look at our world today. . . . [McEwan’s] skill at weaving together suspense, psychological depth and beautiful prose makes him among Britain’s best.” –The Atlanta Journal-Constitution“A major event. . . . Saturday proceeds serenely into very different territory where the most secure existence is ringed by sinister possibilities.” –Time“Thoroughly fascinating. . . . For sheer intelligence and skill, it’s hard to beat Ian McEwan’s Saturday.” –The Philadelphia Inquirer“Impeccable. . . . Beautifully crafted. . . . Fluid, richly textured. . . . Engrossing.” –Entertainment Weekly“Read this book. . . . On the level of the sentence, McEwan is smart, witty and insightful. . . . His writing astounds. . . . Saturday is almost too good to bear.” –The Times-Picayune“Utterly enthralling. . . . Stunningly orderly and harmonious.” –The Seattle Times“Magnificently imagined.” –San Francisco Chronicle“A brilliant work. . . . Astoundingly enjoyable.” –O, The Oprah Magazine“McEwan’s special achievement . . . is not only to give his narrative . . . near-hallucinatory clarity and verisimilitude, but also to make you realize that the world of his novel is our world. It’s a book of poignant insight into the temper of the times. . . . And it’s something rare and precious: a wise book.” –San Jose Mercury News“Hypnotic. . . . Exquisitely detailed, rich and suspenseful, literate and surprisingly explosive.” –The Miami Herald“McEwan’s sentences are perfect, and his novels are always powerful and intelligent.” –People“Sober yet scintillating. . . . Lucidly shows us that civilization and culture and the life of the mind, fragile as they seemingly are, nonetheless have a resilience that can outlast barbarism.” –Christopher Hitchens, The Atlantic Monthly“A magnificent new novel that captures both the comforts and the anxieties of the world we live in right now.” –Vogue“The distinctive achievement of McEwan’s work has been to marry literary seriousness and ambition with a pace and momentum more commonly associated with genre fiction. He is the master clockmaker of novelists, piecing together cogs and wheels of his plots with unerring meticulousness.” –The New York Times Book Review“Marvelous. . . . A magical book. . . . McEwan shows again the quiet brilliance of his prose and his insights.” –Detroit Free Press“Captivating. . . . The prose is so precise and evocative the reader can ‘see’ the scenes unfolding. . . . [McEwan] is at the top of his game.” –The Denver Post